necessarilyproducehappiness,andcanevenbepainful,
but we all require devotion to something more than
ourselves forourlivesto beendurable. Withoutit,we
haveonlyourdesirestoguideus,andtheyarefleeting,
capricious,andinsatiable.Theyprovide,ultimately,only
torment. “By nature, I am a sort of meeting place of
countlessstreamsofancestraltendency.Frommomentto
moment... I am a collection of impulses,” Royce
observed.“Wecannotseetheinnerlight.Letustrythe
outer one.”
Andwedo.Considerthefactthatwecaredeeplyabout
whathappens totheworldafterwe die.Ifself-interest
were the primary source of meaning in life, then it
wouldn’t matter to people if an hour after their death
everyonetheyknowweretobewipedfromthefaceof
theearth.Yetitmattersgreatlytomostpeople.Wefeel
that such an occurrence would make our lives
meaningless.
Theonlywaydeathisnotmeaninglessistoseeyourself
aspartofsomethinggreater:afamily, acommunity,a
society.Ifyoudon’t,mortalityisonlyahorror.Butifyou
do,itisnot.Loyalty,saidRoyce,“solvestheparadoxof
ourordinaryexistencebyshowingusoutsideofourselves
thecausewhichistobeserved,andinsideofourselves
thewillwhichdelightstodothisservice,andwhichis
notthwartedbutenrichedandexpressedinsuchservice.”
Inmorerecenttimes,psychologistshaveusedtheterm
“transcendence” for a version of this idea. Above the
level of self-actualization in Maslow’s hierarchy of
needs, they suggest the existence in people of a